My hero, Harlan, does it again. This time, going after Ann Coulter, but defending George Carlin.

"4. ROB -- I watched as much of The Tonight Show (which I NEVER NEVER NEVER EVER watch) as I could bear, mostly because Peter David called me three-hours-earlier-on-the-Other-Coast and advised me my friend George was gonna be on with the Ilse Koch of the 21st Century (you could look her up). The Elizabeth Bathory of the Insensate Right. The Ma Barker of the Toadying Religiosos. The matriarch of Sawney Beane and his family.

George's spectacular run-on rodomontade, his "routine," was worth the visit. But when that anorectic, Elle-mopped harridan slouched in, as one with the cross-bred praying mantis/black widow spider, and flipped her tresses, and started trying to be unconcerned--and why shouldn't she be, she's a celebrity, AND number one on the Times' bestseller list--and mordant, as Leno played the "let's be evenhanded" game, I'm sure George (who is sagacious and intuitive to beat the band) perceived that Adolf Coulter and her hyena-pack had heavily salted the audience with her claque, and trying to engage or chastise her would be as productive (if even possible) as trying to parse Tolstoy for a cageful of baboons.

No, George knew what he was doing. Everybody who wanted to set them out there on the playground and then yell, "Fight! Fight! Fight!" had nothing to lose. It was George's neck on the line, not mine, not yours, not theirs. He chose the WISE way, not the coward's way.

You find fault with "your heroes," well, tough shit, gang. As Tony Isabella has said, "Hell hath no fury like that of the uninvolved." You find Ann Coulter as vile, degenerate and destructive to our society as I do? Well, do something about it yourself. Don't bitch at George Carlin because he saw how heavily and impossibly unproductively the odds were stacked, and who chose to fight on other battlefields.

Additionally--and you can transpose this observation to me and my career and MY battles with the Anita Bryants, George Wallaces, Jerry Falwells, Richard Nixons, Ronald Reagans, KKKs, and AOLs of the world against whom I've squared-off--at some point you grow too old and heartsick to mount the battlements one more time. You pick your shots instead of fighting them ALL, which was possible when you were fleeter of foot and thought, and you continue to "Do What You Can Do," but you now suggest that a few of those who make nothing but mouth-music about the infelicites of the presented world . . . well, to make no bones about it . . . GO OUT THERE AND SUCK UP A FEW BULLETS YOURSELF, MUTHUHFUCKUH!

George Carlin is, was, remains, a hero. The only difference between George and Lenny, is that they drove Lenny crazy and he made a pact with death to escape them; George has outwitted--and outlived--their best efforts"

Harlan Ellison.